"Force your will upon the world and enslave us to your dream." - Fireaxe "River of Madness"

We are all told to follow our dreams, strive to satisfy ourdesires, and fight hard to keep what is ours, but what happens whenachieving those goals is unrealistic or simply impossible? Few of uslike to admit defeat or part with our highest aspirations and so whenour dreams come into conflict with reality it is often reality, or ourperception of it, which is altered to accommodate the dream. Wetry to imagine a reality in which our dreams come true and thus,truth is often the first casualty of desire. Take, for example, our civic responsibilities. We all wantthe things that the government provides for us, police protection,good schools, better roads, and assistance for the unfortunate, and wewant to see these things improved and better funded. But whenevernew taxes are proposed to pay for those improvements we flatly refuseto pay and vote them down. Do we think that the money will comeout of thin air? Of course not. We want everyone else to pay more,believing, generally without any factual support, that we're payingenough, or too much, and others aren't. We don't bother examiningthe issue since we might find out that we are wrong, and when we dostumble upon facts, we accept them selectively, based on what it isthat we want to believe. The end result that we collectively want morethan we are willing to pay for and we all live in our own little worldswith our own ideas of what government needs to do to fix the problem.And so even in a crisis, which inevitably results, there is little consensus,and any way that we end up settling things appears unjust to many ofus, ensuring future conflict and dissent. In this example it is easy to see that we are collectively actingin a way which makes things harder for ourselves. That much is simple.Figuring out a system for calculating each individual's tax burdenfairly is not simple, and getting everyone to agree that the system isjust is virtually impossible. The basic problem is that we all feelentitled to more than we can collectively have, an attitude that extendsto far more than just taxation and civic improvements. It is a simpletruth that we cannot all be above average although we can all want tobe. And though while a few of us actually make our wildest dreamscome true, the vast majority of people who dream of winning a SuperBowl, getting elected president, or becoming a big rock star have thosedreams dashed sooner or later. But since dreams don't die easily, thedemand for special things far outweighs the supply, guaranteeingconflict, and not always in the form of healthy competition. Collectively we invite trouble by chasing dreams and shootingfor the stars, but individually it is the best way for us to achieve thosegoals. The more you want something, the more motivated you will beto achieve it, and the more likely you will push yourself to become thebest that you can possibly be. As individuals it is better for us to loseour larger perspective, pushing aside the possibility that we could loseand ignoring the plight of those who inevitably will. We benefit fromfocusing solely on achieving our personal goals for holding back inany way results in losing ground to those who do not care about theimpact their intense desires cause. We try so hard because we knowthat when the day of victory occurs the winners will take all and thelosers will be sent home in shame. To work hard and fail is the worstpossible outcome, so we push ourselves to extremes to succeed. Extremerewards invite extreme competition and all the ugliness that surroundsuch behavior. And it isn't just those who push too hard who deservethe blame, all of us support the system in our attitudes towards thewinners and losers, and thus we encourage the system towardsextremes. Such a highly competitive system produces great champions,but it also has the severe drawback of being stunningly myopic. Havinga larger perspective on competition, life, and the world we live in is aliability and as a result many of us do not even bother gathering a deepunderstanding of things. Our personal goals become all-consuming,and anyone or anything that gets in our way is viewed as being anenemy to be defeated. Long term planning is cast aside for greaterreturns on short term goals for if you are not sure that you will be ontop for long, why plan for something that will be of greater benefit tothe one who beats you and takes your place? Such systems are not stable due to lack of foresight on thepart of those within them. To some degree that is a good thing, sinceall will be given a respite from the madness as the system collapses,but a catastrophic collapse is far from enjoyable and often we chooseto support the system since it is the lesser of two evils. Speaking of evil, I, as well as Octavio Ramos, are hard atwork writing material for the new project "Eternal Devotion to theDark Goddess". Although many miles apart, thanks to the internetwe are busy co-authoring what promises to be one of the hottest trackson the disk. I plan to write out all the tracks before starting therecording process, so it will be a while before I'll have cuts from thenew CD for you to hear. Stay tuned. A big ‘Hello’ to anyone receiving the Burning Blade for thefirst time. This is the Fireaxe newsletter.

Some good reviews and a hearty hail to Fireaxe's biggest supporters

More reviews of "Victory or Death" have come in and thenew ones have been more positive than the older ones. As before, thereviewers don't go into depth about the music, sticking mainly toreporting who Fireaxe is, which bands Fireaxe sounds like, andgiving the music an overall rating. That's pretty much what every CDgets except for those the reviewer either loves or loathes, so I'm notgetting, nor am I demanding, special treatment. But what disappointsme about webzine reviews is how little publicity they have generatedfor Fireaxe. I have yet to have a single person tell me that they foundout about Fireaxe through a webzine demo review of "Victory or Death".It makes me wonder if anyone bothers reading them at all. So is it all wasted effort? Probably not, since publicity of anykind is beneficial, even bad press. A few years back someone who rana site where every week he posted a "worst of the internet" award alongwith a ridicule-filled rant stumbled across the Fireaxe site around thetime that "Lovecraftian Nightmares" was in release. The guy did apretty nasty write-up, although he was so uninformed about Fireaxethat his cheap shots completely missed their target. But not long afterthat I got an e-mail from one of his readers who had decided to listento a few Fireaxe mp3s, liked them, and wanted to order a copy of theCD. Mind you, that's not the kind of attention I'd like to get, but itjust goes to show that there is some truth behind the adage that"any press is good press". But it seems like in the super-saturated market for new musicthat good press doesn't get anyone's attention unless it's extremely goodpress, and I am thankful that Fireaxe has a number of people who havebeen so inspired by my music that they've written glowing reviews ofFireaxe in high traffic areas on the internet. They have been the oneswho have spread Fireaxe around the world, encouraging many to atleast listen to what I have to offer and decide for themselves if theylike it. A hearty hail goes out to Lord Vic and his constant praise ofFireaxe on metal-rules.com. About 90% of the people who contact meabout buying CDs tell me that it was Lord Vic who prompted them tosample Fireaxe mp3s. I also owe a great debt to Bim Landers andNicolas Bonneau for their ongoing support. Hails to you guys, andmany others, for keeping the spotlight on my works. Nicolas is my French distributor, and he'd be spreading CDsacross that beautiful country if there hadn't been a postal breakdownalong the way. No one knows what happened, but somewhere betweenhere and there an uninsured, unregistered package containing ten copiesof "Food for the Gods" almost got lost in the mail, never to be seenagain. After submitting a formal complaint to the postmaster thepackage was returned to me more than three months after I sent it out,along with a bill for the return postage. Where had it been? We are notsure, but one of the stickers on it said that it had been through Germany.Germany? Exactly how the international postal service could take a largepackage with the destination clearly written on it in big letters (FRANCE)and send it to the wrong country is beyond me. But at least I got the CDsback, and soon Nicolas will be able to go about his work spreading theanti-gospel.

The oppositional nature of consciousness

In edition 7.6 of this newsletter I wrote a short essay whichprobed the oppositional nature of ideologies. I made quite a number ofpoints, the main ones being: that all ideologies are defined in oppositionto some threat to their existence; that they are at their most powerful andmotivated when fighting against that threat; and that in the absence ofthat threat they seek out other rivals which can take the place of thevanquished opposition. In this newsletter I will make similar argumentsconcerning consciousness and how people behave in much the sameway as ideologies. But first there are a few things about ideologies thatI would like to comment on as they relate to the post-election period inthe U.S. Note that I wrote about ideologies before the last election. In George W. Bush's second inaugural address it almostseemed as if his speech writer was an avid reader of my newsletter,using my theories to construct a speech which would motivate allAmericans to destroy our adversary, tyranny, in the name of our god,Freedom. Everything that I wrote about was in evidence in the address:the warnings of complacency, the morphing of the dictatorships of oldinto current world powers, and the depiction of the entire world as adesperate struggle between good and evil. It remains to be seen justhow much those ideals are put into actions but the "Freedom Crusade"is certainly on the march. In BB7.6 I wrote, "In their quest to destroy their adversaries,ideologies can turn inwards upon themselves, conducting a campaignof ideological purification. This often becomes necessary when asubstantial number of followers cannot make the connection betweenthe current adversary and the original adversary of the ideology."By the time of the inaugural address this had already happened to agreat degree in the one area that President Bush had the most controlover, his cabinet. Out went the last of the moderates and in went theextremists and yes-men, or rather yes-persons. Furthermore, in thepreceding months there had been an ideological purge at the CIAwith a number of senior officials being forced into retirement. Addedto that was an expansion of an intelligence gathering group headed bythe pentagon which has no congressional oversight and is completelycontrolled by the executive branch. Even though it is this sort ofconsolidation of power that the U.S. was created to oppose, as longas the true believers in charge see a difference between themselvesand their enemies they will continue to seize power, in ways muchlike their foes, to use against their enemies, foreign and domestic. I'd be very worried about this situation if it weren't for thefact that control of the U.S. economy has been placed squarely in thehands of foreigners, some of whom are run by the very governmentsthat the U.S. opposes. With a massive debt and a constant need formore loans, the U.S. government and its citizens can ill afford topush their drive for "A New American Century" too far. Foreigninvestors can pull the plug at any time. The only trouble is that if theU.S. economy falls, everyone's economy falls, and so foreign lenderssee pulling the rug out from under America as a tool of last resort.Nonetheless, I feel that time is getting close. Now, turning towards the oppositional nature ofconsciousness. In the Fireaxe theory I made the followingcontentions regarding consciousness: that consciousness is createdby instilling within a person a permanent sense of inadequacy, inessence a state of constant fear; and that the deeper the sense ofinadequacy, the stronger the person is motivated, generally toserve their ideology. It is here where we can see the reason whyboth ideology and consciousness share an oppositional nature: anideology is much more unified if it, and its members, all stand togetherin opposition to a similar foe. It benefits an ideology to force itsoppositional nature on individuals. Thus, within every ideology thereare a great number of lessons that are taught to its members about thedangers of its adversary with the intent of crafting the consciousnessof its members in such a way that they fear and oppose it. This unityof vigilance solidifies the structure of the ideology as newly madeconscious members conform to the ideological system. I view consciousness as being a state of hyper-vigilancenecessary for survival within a modern society. I've discussed mytheory on consciousness elsewhere and so I will only go over it brieflyhere. The demands of the modern world require each person to havean internal model of the world which includes a model of himself orherself which they can use to perform long term planning. Longterm planning is critical in today's world, since without it you mustalways react to things as they occur, which, in our modern society, isoften far too late. You need to be able to plan for the future andvisualize yourself testing out various options to be able to make agood choice. Once you have such an internal model, you can seeyourself in your mind's eye, know that you exist, and thus areconscious. There are many dangers within our society despite its calmappearance and overly-publicized sensational crimes. Most of thesedangers come in the form of victimization and exploitation witha great many of them being perfectly legal. As a child you mustconform to avoid humiliation at the hands of your peers and workhard to live up to the expectations of your parents and teachers. Asan adult you face those same pressures and more, including living upto the expectations of your boss and spouse, providing for yourfamily, and fending off the constant assault on your wealth from alldirections. Failing in any one of these areas can result in anythingfrom mild discomfort to a major personal catastrophe, so we try hardto succeed. Successful defense requires consciousness so that we canthink through all the problems that we face and avoid falling for thetricks and traps of clever con artists. But consciousness is more thansomething which forms when dangers are imminent and then goesaway when they are distant. Consciousness is a permanent state, andthat implies a continuous source of danger. I think that consciousnessis made permanent by repeatedly exposing someone to sometimestraumatic failures until the fear of failure has been made indeliblein the mind of the individual. This can come about as a series oflesser traumatic events, a single very traumatic event, or somecombination of the two. It matters not how it comes about, since theimportant part is that the individual will always feel the fear of failureand thus will always work towards preventing it. We don't set out to traumatize our children and peers, in factwe usually set out to do the opposite since we love and respect them,but both we and our society have expectations for our children thatthey need to live up to or else they will suffer both in the present andin the future. So in order to help them to meet those expectations, weare forced to motivate them to achieve. We try to use the "carrot only"approach, but that can only get us so far. Punishment is required toprevent our children from doing things that we don't want them to doand also to prevent them from becoming spoiled, lethargic, or content.So when they fall short, and they inevitably do, the hammer comesdown. Punishment isn't necessarily a physical beating. In fact, thatis not the most effective form of punishment. Far more powerful,and potentially traumatic or damaging as well, is some sort ofdeprivation, such as taking away a beloved possession, social isolation,or withholding affection from the child. We don't want to do thesethings, but we do them because we they work: motivation is increasedand expectations are often reached where the "carrot only" approachhad failed. But there are dangers. It isn't easy to get exactly the resultswe want, usually because we are not in a rational state when we areapplying punishment, and severe trauma leading to mental disorderscan sometimes be the result. This may sound like I am contending that consciousness issome form of insanity. I wouldn't go so far as to say that, but due tothe similarities between consciousness and dissociation disorders itseems that consciousness is in essence a mild form of dissociationwith similar causes and mechanisms. Dissociation is a form of mentalparalysis, temporarily disconnecting mind from body, which stops theperson from moving or acting in any way. It is the "freeze" part of theinstinctive fight, flight, or freeze reaction to dangers and served ourancestors and predecessors well during encounters with predators wholocated their prey primarily through detecting motion. I think that inconscious people, this dissociation mechanism enables us to stop andthink whenever we encounter dangers, serving as a layer between theoutside world and our thoughts, and as a layer between our thoughtsand our actions. Since most of the dangers we face are not immediate,we can afford the luxury of waiting and thinking through our options.And since many of the dangers we face are complicated, we need toprevent ourselves from acting reflexively or impulsively lest we dothe wrong thing. Also, with practice, I think we are able to relax thetotal paralysis part of the dissociation mechanism so that we can thinkand act at the same time. We can also learn to be thinking about onething while we are doing another, allowing us to deal with dangersfull time while going about our daily lives. That is pretty much thedefinition of dissociation, a sharp division between mind and body,but not so sharp as to inhibit all action. Thus, in my view, as consciousorganisms we are constantly in fear, to a degree, and constantly tryingto work our way out of that fear. I think that the conscious state is oneof mild, controlled panic. The goal of child rearing is to place the child into this stateof controlled panic by applying punishment until the state becomespermanent. Now, it would seem that this type of child rearing wouldresult in the child having an adversarial relationship with the parentsince the parent is the one who applies the punishment. Of course,this is not desirable since the member of an ideology shouldn't cometo view a surrogate of that ideology as their adversary. So instead,the force which is responsible for a child's failure in meeting socialexpectations is said to be something other than the punishing agent.In most cases the child itself is blamed, or at least the part of thechild associated with the ideology's adversary. In Christian mythology, bad behavior is either blamed on thedevil, or stems from the evil within us all as a result of original sin.This ties bad behavior to the abstract adversary of the ideology andresults in the process of socialization being portrayed as a battlebetween good and evil for the child's soul. In more secular ideologies,bad behavior is seen as stemming from the child's animal instinctswhich must be purged so that one can become civilized. Note herethat seeing a part of one's self as being animalistic or evil and tryingto distance yourself from it contributes to the dissociative feature ofconsciousness: the child tries to dissociate his mind from his body.But regardless of ideology, during child rearing the adversary of theideology is always connected with the force which causes the constantstate of fear in the individual. Furthermore, it is that constant state offear which drives consciousness, giving it a reason for being. A childis made constantly afraid of something and is constantly trying to figureout a way to make the fear go away. But the child cannot, as the fearis a permanent feature, and thus so is conscious. The adversarialrelationship lasts a lifetime. But it is not always the case that a child accepts the ideology'sadversary as his or her own. In some cases the child will see hispunishment as unjust and see authority figures as adversaries. Thisform of anti-authoritarianism can also be bent to the will of theideology if the person can be made to see that the authority figureshe or she has contempt for are those of rival ideologies or are corruptmembers of the current ideology. I think that the majority of peoplehave more than one adversarial prototype inside them, havingexperienced different forms of at least minor trauma at the hands ofmany, and that people have a mixture of both types of adversarialrelationships: the weaker adversary which needs to be controlled orpurged, and the stronger adversary which needs to be overthrown.I also think that the mixture isn't always balanced with peopletending one way or another. Putting terms to these two archetypesI could call one conformist and authoritarian and the other rebelliousand anti-authoritarian, but in real life the labels will be blurred aspeople share both forms and express them in different situations. In the essay I wrote on the adversarial nature of ideologiesI made a rather disturbing contention that in the absence of a rivalideology which serves as an adversary, an ideology will either find anew adversary or turn inward on itself, indulging in either purificationor ideological mutation. I think that the same premise is true forconsciousness. Although the state of fear that drives consciousnessis permanent, it can grow stronger or weaker depending on externalforces which are perceived as threats. Since this force directly drivesour consciousness, our drive and energy grow stronger as our fearsbecome greater. Fear can be very motivating, and can propel us togreat heights, allowing us to reach our true potential, and thus it isin our best interests not to live in peace, but in a manageable stateof fear. And so, like ideologies, we make war on our adversariesand seek out new adversaries to replace those that we have eithervanquished or are no longer a part of our lives. And sometimeswe find surrogate adversaries to take the place of adversaries whowe cannot oppose in real life. The reason is simple: the strugglemakes us strong. It makes us who we are. This quest to defeat adversaries can take a socially positiveform, such as taking on great challenges, replacing them withgreater challenges after we've succeeded and the luster wears off ourpast glories. But the quest can also take on a socially negative form,such as individuals seeking to re-live their past traumas in search ofrevenge and finding new adversaries which will play the role of theirold ones. Since past traumas deal with adversarial relationships withauthority figures, loved ones, and peers, re-living these events oftentakes the forms of crime and disobedient behavior, deliberatelycausing harm to a spouse or loved one, searching for or simplyprovoking fights with others, or engaging in the same traumaticbehaviors experienced earlier in life, either from the submissiveside or the dominant side. The abused becoming the abuser is acommon example of reliving traumatic experiences from the past.Furthermore, since the adversary can never be truly beaten (it ispermanent in the mind) the struggle is often played out over andover, becoming pathological, as if a person was addicted to theexperience. We can see this more easily in extreme cases, but themechanism of re-living past traumas applies to milder traumasas well. How many of us know of others who always seem to getthemselves into the same situations or conflicts over and over?And how many of us seem to find ourselves re-living past traumasor acting as those we once despised? Doesn't it sometimes seem likewe are actively trying to bring these things on ourselves? We are.Although these are sometimes dangerous or self-destructive behaviors,we do them because they reinforce our identity and make us feelconscious and alive. We are at our best when we are fighting toothand nail against our adversary although our "best" may be a shockingdisplay of cruelty or pathological behavior. We do these thingsbecause our alternative is to turn inward on ourselves, engaging inself-hatred and a desire to change or purify ourselves. But eitherway we are driven by a desire to find and defeat new adversariesbe they others or ourselves. The concept of adversaries in the mind is nothing new.They're also called "inner demons", "voices in our heads", "monkeyson our backs", or simply "issues". We all have them, to one degreeor another, but only see them as a problem when they cause veryanti-social or self-destructive behaviors. The field of psychotherapyis focused around ridding people of their worst adversaries or at leastallowing people to control them. Since the Fireaxe theory states thatsince adversaries are permanent, trying to rid yourself of them isan exercise in futility. However, it is possible to change the formof your adversary by throwing off the old perceived causes of yourworst fears and adopting new ones. This is what religion has donefor centuries. Conversion is the process of freeing people from pastadversarial relationships while remaking those adversaries to be thoseof the religion. Though religious converts may claim to be free, they'vereally only traded in their old inner demons for new ones. Butconversion techniques are hardly restricted to religion, and you cansee examples of ideologies, advertisers, cults, and other institutionsusing fear to sell their message. And while sometimes they seem to beselling only beautiful dreams, beware of the adversary coming inthrough the back door. Consciousness and the permanent state of fear have asymbiotic relationship. We seek out new adversaries to make usstronger, and we need to defeat our adversaries to make the painand fear go away, at least temporarily. In essence we are trapped ina continuous cycle of creating and destroying rivals, much like howpolice shows require their writers to produce an endless successionof criminals to be put behind bars. Indeed, those shows, and movies,that we love to watch are like surrogate experiences for us. Wemeet an adversary, he is built up into a fearsome force, and thenhe is brought down to earth. We feel uncomfortable when the feargrows and relieved when it goes away, at least for a little while.Sports contests act in a similar way, as do soap operas, realitytelevision, and especially computer games. We become addicted tothese things, and our society's tremendous desire for such surrogateexperiences is strong support for an adversarial relationship lyingat the core of our being. If there is nothing that we can do about changing ourmental state, the question becomes how can we focus people towardsmore socially positive behaviors rather than pathological ones.I think that the key lies in a contention I made about ideologicalstruggle: that aggressive ideologies must continue to grow or faceinternal strife as their aggressive members will feed on each otherto satisfy their needs. Contentment is a behavior that is universallyviewed as bad by all modern societies and thus we are unable torest on our past achievements. Growth is all important, and onlyin a growing society it is possible for each person to reach a greaterheight without taking away from someone else. Without thatgrowth there will be internal conflict and pathological behaviorsof every kind. So we are compelled to grow, sometimes at greatcost. The trouble is that we live in a world which is both rapidlyexpanding its population and rapidly exhausting its resources.We cannot grow at this rate for long, and thus the future does notlook at all peaceful.

The Fireaxe theory - Outline

I. Basics - well established theories

1. Emergent systems - that complex systems can arise from theinteractions of simple things2. Natural selection - that organisms mutate, proliferate, and compete,with the "losers" becoming extinct3. Behavioral science - that neurological systems, at their core, functionaccording to the rules of conditioning4. Entropy - that within a closed system, entropy always increases,which limits the amount of transformation that can occur

II. Extensions

1. That consciousness is an emergent system: a complex system arisingin the human mind from the interaction of simple neurons.2. That civilizations are emergent systems arising from the physicalinteractions of humans whether conscious or not.3. That ideologies are emergent systems arising from the psychologicalinteractions of conscious humans4. That emergent systems follow the laws of natural selection in muchthe same way that organisms do5. That the universe is, by definition, a closed system

III. Contentions regarding consciousness

1. That consciousness is a survival advantage2. That being a member of an ideology is a survival advantage3. That making its members conscious is a necessary part of anideology's survival4. That consciousness is created by instilling within a person apermanent sense of inadequacy - in essence a state of constant fear5. That the deeper the sense of inadequacy, the stronger the personis motivated - generally to serve their ideology

IV. Contentions regarding ideological struggle

1. That ideologies fight for survival using many methods including,but not limited to, war and enslavement2. That aggression is a survival advantage3. That aggressive ideologies make members of rival ideologiesfeel afraid and inadequate which in response become more aggressive,thus creating a vicious circle4. That aggressive ideologies must continue to grow or face internalstrife as their aggressive members will feed on each other to satisfytheir needs5. That internal struggle results in ideological mutation

V. Contentions regarding the future

1. That internal strife is inevitable since the laws of entropy implythat continuous growth is not sustainable2. That the abstract bases for ideologies transcend mortality and thussuicidal aggression is not restrained by fear of death3. That ideological mutation will eventually result in the creation ofa suicidal ideology which will attempt to save the human race bydestroying it

How to order Fireaxe CDs:

Ordering Fireaxe CD's is an informal process as I am sellingthem personally out of my apartment. Simply mail me a letter whichcontains the following:

1. The names of the CDs that you want to buy.2. The address where you want the CDs sent.3. Cash, a check, or a money order for the total cost.

Here is a price list. The first number is the cost for U.S.based customers, the second is for outside the U.S. The pricesinclude shipping and handling.

Food for the Gods: $12 $14Victory or Death $5 $7Lovecraftian Nightmares $5 $7A Dream of Death $5 $7

Send everything to:

Brian Voth 1301 Medical Center Dr. #415 Chula Vista, CA 91911 USA

If you review CDs on a website or in a magazine, any oneof the single CDs (Not "Food for the Gods") is free of charge inexchange for the review. In this case all I need is a request bye-mail. Please send me the URL of your review site or copy of yourmagazine with the review in it when it is done. If you want toexchange CDs, tapes, or stuff of equivalent value, make theserequests via e-mail and we'll arrange a trade. The CDs come with a booklet filled with awesome art, aletter about the project, and some information about the CD whichcan also be found on the Fireaxe site. Lastly, if you want to print and distribute Fireaxe CDs Ican send you an additional CD which contains tiff files for all thebooklets, tray cards, and labels for each project. The tiff disk is freeso just say the word.

The Future

I’ve been focusing so hard on “Food for the Gods” that I’vehad little time to think about what I’d like to record next. Over thepast few months I’ve tossed around some ideas and have come upwith a working title and theme. The next Fireaxe work will dig evendeeper into the dark crevices of our society and our minds, pull forththe myths that we cling to and hold dear, and expose them all for whatthey are. While “A Dream of Death” explored the madness of dreams,and “Food for the Gods” described the chaos wrought upon the earthby ideologies, “Eternal Devotion to the Dark Goddess” will depict thepsychological enslavement of the individual in modern times. It willbe the darkest Fireaxe work ever. But don’t put your order in just yet.After wrapping up “Food for the Gods” I’ll need a while to rest andupgrade my studio. I’m spent. My goal is to deliver music to whoever wants to hear it inwhatever way is necessary. Whatever the market demands, I will supply,but I do want to avoid the mass marketing channel. Exposure is fine, butin the modern business, the substance of the music must be altered tomatch the demands of the marketplace. This would totally defeat thepurpose of why I write music in the first place. I write music because itis a way to express my emotions. What I both think and feel goes intothe songs. That is the power, Fireaxe is the channel, and any diversiondiminishes the emotive effect. Thus I try to avoid such diversions.That is how art should be.

Rights to duplicate Fireaxe materials

Currently Fireaxe is not for profit. I sell the single CDs for$5, $12 for "Food for the Gods" since it is three CDs, which coversthe production and mailing costs. For CDs sent out of the country,I'll have to charge an extra $2 per disk to cover the additional mailingcost. If you write reviews or put samples on your website I'll give you aCD for free. Since I am not making any money with the currentrecordings, you are free to make duplicates of them to distribute aslong as you obey the following guidelines:

1. You can only sell the duplications for the price of the medium or less, plus any delivery cost. You are not allowed to make any profit with the music.2. You should tell me how many copies you gave out and who got them so I can keep track. Also, if they have an e-mail address I'd like that as well so I can add them to the mailing list.3. You are likewise free to adorn any webpages or duplications with the gifs and jpgs on my website as long as you include an obvious link back to my website. This includes putting Fireaxe song samples on your site as well.4. You are free to play any Fireaxe songs (in unaltered form) provided you are an unsigned band without a marketing tie-in. You are not allowed to record those songs onto anything that you will sell.5. You are food for the gods.6. You are required to crank the song "Hounds of Tindalos" as loud as you can as often as you can. It’s your only defense against THEM. Be warned, they come through angles. Note that the CD is round. Are your speaker cabinets square?7. Cthulhu, the Necronomicon, Hastur the Unspeakable, and all other mythos creatures are purely the inventions of Lovecraft and other fiction authors. None of it is real, at least that’s what I’m going to say in court if you try to sue me for destruction of your property, house, city, or soul as a result of listening to the “Lovecraftian Nightmares” CD too much.8. You are free to play "The Rack" in school or church or any other institution bent on crushing your will and turning you into a mindless zombie slave of the corporate dominated world. Try not to develop a bad attitude about it.9. You are not free to commit suicide while listening to any Fireaxe song. I'm sorry, I'll have to prosecute. On a serious note, if you are thinking about doing it, please e-mail or call me if you have no one else to talk to. When I was in my teens the album "The Wall" by Pink Floyd used to really get to me. Just hearing songs like "Comfortably Numb", and "Hey You" would get me pretty depressed and mildly suicidal. I'm just trying to say that I've been there. If my music is having that effect on you, please get in touch. You aren't alone.

The gist of it is that you can do just about anything with themusic as long as you don't profit from it and that I get some sort ofcredit for having written it. I'm open to any methods of distributingmy music, such as compilation tapes or CDs, radio play, or recordinglabel distribution. However, you will need my direct permission todo so or some kind of legal agreement.

Ending Comments

Any comments or questions are welcome. If anyone has anyupdates on their projects, I'd like to hear from you. I know thereare a few people out there working on some cool things that I haven'theard from in a while. Drop me an e-mail regarding how you'regetting along.

Brian

--"You shall break down their alters, and dash into pieces their pillars, hew down their asherim, and burn their graven images with fire. For I am a jealous god and I shall have no rivals."

Blood Fire Death Records released the new full length CD of Canada's LUST, entitled "Genesis of a Satanic Race." It is incredibly harsh and dissonent occult metal which will surprise some who've heard the older Lust releases as there are many doom filled moments within the hellish insanity. Includes Spear of Longinus cover. Not for everyone...

Of all the subcultures to emerge following the dominance of rock over popular music, heavy metal and its associated genres remain unique in that they have maintained a counter-culture that targets not just the visible "establishment," but also all things that hold the core values of that philosophical system; metal is a naturalistic movement opposed to the utilitarian values of modern society, but it has kept its head up and thus far mostly avoided assimilation by not taking an explicitly political stance, but an artistic and metaphorical one.

This outlook has increasing driven it out of the mainstream consciousness, which has allowed it to keep its independence in part by mostly separating itself from the crowd of hopeless people looking for an identity and an easy, one-size-fits-all solution to they subliminal angst they feel about living in a fatalistic and submissive era. Of course, it has not managed this exclusively; some of the biggest sheep, and most profound losers, of our time have been metalheads, even some who have been very influential in the genre. In this way, within the metal genre the drama of the larger society is acted out in microcosm: the few who understand pulling away from the mass which wants what they have, and would emulate it to the point of drowning out legitimate voices in the genre.

What makes the mass destructive is the nature of a crowd, by definition: it is people who come together on the basest pretense and, out of fear for their individual selves, enacts a mass-will upon society at large to remove anything that threatens the herd. When you see a crowd, you are not seeing uniform people, but vastly different people who are disorganized and thus can only accept the lowest common denominator motivation, which is usually as follows: do not criticize me for anything that I do, insofar as I do not violate this basic tenet of crowd-belief toward others; give to me everything that our best people have, as I am participating in the crowd and thus "contributing." As with all utilitarian systems, this mentality punishes the more capable in order to keep the broader masses from feeling inferior, or that they're missing out.

Heavy metal music, by its very nature and alienation, recognizes that society operates on two levels: a public level, which comprises the kind of things you'd tell a crowd to make them feel you have their best interests at heart, and a private level, at which actual motivations are acted upon using the tokens of the public level in such a way that their function does not match their definition. It is a lot like hacking, actually; you overload some kind of input buffer with data that appears to be harmless, but contains concealed instructions that the machine, unaware that something labeled "data" might be "code," executes and hands control to the intruder. William S. Burroughs famously declared, "Language is a virus," and thus explained the same concept as applies to modern mass-media psychology.

What happens in a computer is that it confuses appearance with reality; the code is reality, but the idea that it is harmless data is the appearance. Similarly in our society we are divided between appearance, which generally consists of happy nonsense to keep you distracted, and reality, which is the relentless pursuit of wealth and a spiritual emptiness that justifies it. (As mentioned here before, this takes us back to a split that the Greeks noticed, between things as they are and their abstractions, which are often mentioned as that which casts a shadow, with the shadow we see being what we know of "reality.")

Since any tokens manipulated on the public level have dual meaning, and are thus meaningless, heavy metal targetted something more sublime: emotions and self-image. The Gothic, Romanticist, naturalistic and elitist-individualist imagery of even Black Sabbath and Led Zeppelin did this, but it flowered from there into a proliferation of forms, each of which took the basic concept and developed it further, all without explicitly knowing why or what was being done. This ignorance of an articulation of what is being done allowed it to be passed, from mind to mind, through the subconscious channel of appealing imagery and concept in personal life, much as it was done in Romanticist literature, art and music: those who found greatness in the past, specifically medieval and ancient civilizations, and could process a melancholy acceptance of death and desire for personal greatness in heroic accomplishment, would naturally find the music appealing.

This is in part because, in addition to imagery, metal music literally sounds like the description of Romantic ideals above. It doesn't embrace the centralized harmonic structures of rock music, which is Indo-European folk music simplified to the degree of fixing a harmonic center and manipulating major/minor changes for mood, over a syncopated beat so that even the dumbest person can follow it, and it doesn't embrace the pleasing sounds and casual human vocal noises of pop. Where pop attempts to define beauty and approximate it as a medium, metal attempts to find what is beautiful in that which is, on the level of things that explicitly defined, ugly. If society exists on a level where public discourse is manipulated by private reality, metal is an inversion of that, such that the meaning of public discourse is found within private reality.

Metaphorically, metal almost exactly mirrors Romanticist literature, even down to its fascination with nature and the occult. Loneliness and alienation create independence; obsession with the forces of nature and the power of warfare creates a post-moralistic sense of seeing how life works rather than judging it; wandering into the embrace of Satan affirms the pagan belief that there can be no public level of "good" separated from "bad," but that good and bad are forces which together create a meta-good, mainly the ongoing process of life itself. These are the values of metal, and they are almost never explicitly spelled out because to do so, in the music, would be to expose the inner workings of the subculture to manipulation by those who have not discovered this meaning on their own; emulation and cheapening would follow.

For this reason, it is important to remember that Satanism in metal is metaphor. Many of the largest proponents of Satanic imagery in metal were Deists and some were Christians, but used Satan in a way similar to that of John Milton or William Blake to describe the individual Will or Ego; when Black Sabbath wrote "War Pigs," and described how modern society sends its workers off to die in foreign fields for abstract and mostly irrelevant political objectives masking a private reality of profit and power, they concluded it with "Satan laughing spreads his wings" not to praise Satan but to describe, in theological metaphor, what had occurred: humans had confused public reality with absolute truth, and thus been manipulated, and from that, an inner resentment and fatalism expressed itself in the confusion that followed. Satan laughing spreads his wings: a statement of the futility of our time, and in later bands, of the uselessness of religions that conflate Absolute truth with the public level of reality.

In doing this, metal attacked the fundamental Platonic split between the world of appearance and the world of structure; appearance was seen to be aesthetic, and not necessarily related to structure, which was defined by context, something which theological and occult imagery, by the nature of its cosmological outlook, expresses succinctly. While hardcore punk musicians attempted to rearrange the symbols of the public imagery into a meaningful private discourse, metal brushed past and declared the public reality defunct, urging its listeners to look instead toward their inner motivations and animal feelings. However, as with all things, the surging crowd - those who by definition did not and thus could not do it the first time around - sees something it likes and apes it furiously, producing a parody of it by only understanding the level of appearance and taking that appearance as truth, something which belongs to the domain of structure alone.

For this reason, although I have never been a Satanist, I have often employed Satanic and occult imagery in my writing, much as the smarter metal bands have done. In a world ruled by a Christian or secularized Christian (liberal) concept of absolute truth as public reality, one strikes back by upholding all that cannot be ruled by such a petty device, in the process pointing out that such dualistic thought patterns are in fact a simple rhetorical device misinterpreted by the crowd and thus used for its own purposes. In contrast, the crowd embraces Satanism as a truth in itself, and tries through silly literal rituals and laughable posing to be "truer" Satanists that the others, or more "extreme," or some variation of attempting to find a devotional truth in life. It cannot be done, and therefore these bands and individuals tend to ring hollow to the thinker, and their works -- well, let us say that in the years following 1996, there have perhaps been three black metal bands of the caliber of those who occurred 1990-1996, and it is similar in their own times with other subgenres of metal.

I can extend this concept further. National Socialism is popular in some black metal circles, but that is mainly because it's easier to label oneself a National Socialist and start collecting gear and posing than it is to understand the core concept of National Socialism, which is a feudalistic ethnocultural post-moral revival of classical Indo-European culture. That relatively complex thought gets distilled down to, as Faulkner said, "a hatred of black skins" alone, and thus parodies itself. What kind of idiot believes that African genocide will solve humanity's problems? Black Sabbath were more advanced in thought with "Satan laughing spreads his wings" than all the goose-stepping fools, or those from the opposite end who make the same mistake, the leftist: they assume that by labelling themselves as egalitarian and tolerant that humanity's problems will resolve themselves on the level of public discourse. All of them are misguided, and represent waste by the roadside of a path to knowledge.

Death metal and grindcore had its own version of this comedy. Bands like Carcass and Morpheus used intricate descriptions of death and decay as a way of reminding their audience that public reality is a dream designed to deny death, and that when we realize our own mortality, we can comprehend that meaning is not found in public discourse or in liberal/conservative platitudes, but in addressing reality - yes, actual reality, including that good and bad are needed to produce meta-good - we liberate ourselves from illusion and can begin work on the real task. They were followed by unnamed and now thankfully forgotten bands who found an identity in glorifying death, bloodshed, violence, disease, perversity and disgust, all in full ignorance of the original concept. It is not surprising the music of these bands was also of a lesser nature, as their thinking was clearer on a more basic, linear level.

In my view, there is truth to be found in all of these viewpoints, if interpreted correctly. National Socialism and liberalism are not that far apart when we look at their basic motivation; both want to establish healthy cultures where people are not left to the predatory whim of speculative capital. Satan and gore both wish to affirm natural belief over that of the thing-as-named public reality. Even Christians and pagans have the same essential goal, which is to find a larger reason to have values outside the material and thus find meaning in existence. However, our time is confused, as somewhere along the path to this "great" industrial society we have lost the systems of thought that give a whole meaning to the entire process of life, instead of selecting some aspect with which to label oneself and hold up as a shield of "meaning" against death. In a confused time, only a few actually seek truth, while everyone else looks for it as they might a product on a shelf or the best fruit among the ripening burden of branches.

This article is not an attempt to discredit or assault bands who use Satan as metaphor; much like Blake, or Dante, or Eliot, or any number of artists, their quest is legitimate. It should serve, however, as an introduction to the theory of metal as an art form, and an explanation of why there are so many mediocre imitators, of "Satanist" or leftist or NSBM variety alike, and only a few leaders, and thus, a mandate for future thinkers in this genre to start with the leaders and not the followers. Metal remains under assault by both public culture and public "counter-culture" (an anti-establishment affirmation of public cultural beliefs, in trendier form) alike, and thus must keep an intellectual and artistic lead or it will be assimilated and left with Slipknot, Korn and Creed as its tombstone.

In all of any genre, there's a few that really nail what it is to be that genre, and these tend to be known to history while others are footnotes. Another "list shit that you think impressed you" thread is NOT needed, so please don't do the typical Internet shithead thing and list fifteen obscure bands that make you sound cool, in your own world. Instead, think about the handful of bands that defined metal.

At War With Self is the project name for an instrumental trio that was put together by guitarist/composer Glenn Snelwar. He is perhaps best known for his vital contributions to the first offering from Sean Malone's Gordian Knot project. At War With Self's debut release, Torn Between Dimensions, features Snelwar on guitars, mandolins and keyboards, Michael Manring on fretless bass and e-bow, and Mark Zonder on drums and percussion. Mark Zonder's progressive drumming forms the backbone for Snelwar's guitars, mandolins and keyboards that intertwine with Michael Manring's expressive fretless bass lines and e-bow. The idea behind Torn Between Dimensions is to create compositions that have an intensity of emotion and incorporate a wide variety of influences. Derived from an equal passion for progressive rock and metal bands such as King Crimson, Voivod and Pink Floyd, classical composers such as Leo Brouwer, Bela Bartok and Heitor Villa Lobos, to such diverse influences as bluegrass and jazz, Torn Between Dimensions is the realization of how Glenn chooses to take these influences and combine them into something undeniably progressive and strikingly original. The end result is a dense wall of sound, where multiple genres are explored within each song, as one song flows seamlessly into the next.

The intent of my work is to create innovative, experimental compositions using classical, electric guitars, mandolin, various percussion, piano and string sections, that encompass many influences and genres.

Metal made me a eugenicist when I saw how different the new fans were from the older ones. Yes, there have always been stupid people in metal - hordes of 'em. But there was once a leadership caste as well, and now it's mostly gone.

I am producing a documentary on metal and hardcore music. My cameracrew and I will be touring the country most of the spring and summer.We will be in Houston on April 15th and 16th. We are looking forlocal sponsors to be involved so that we do not have to have a bigcorporate sponsor.

The filming will be at the Engine Room on the 15th and the RhythmRoom on the 16th. The documentary will consist of live footage, interviewswith bands, promoters, and fans in the Houston area.

The documentary will be released nationwide on DVD format in thefall of 05. It will be sold as three separate DVD’s divided by regionor as a three DVD set.

Each sponsor will have their logo on every official Mancuso Production’sposter and handbill. Every sponsor will have a 30 second commercialtied into their city’s section of the documentary. The commercialwill be shot by our camera crew so that it blends into the rest ofthe documentary. Sponsors will have the option to be interviewedon the documentary to explain how they have contributed to the localmetal scene. Finally, you will be allowed to have a booth at thefilming to pass out promotional material for your company and bannersare more than welcome.

If you are interested in being a sponsor of the show and being apart of the documentary please contact me in one of the followingways.

Morbid Angel have reformed with original Vocalist and bassist David Vincentand are undertakinga series of Tours, including a USA trip throughoutfebruary with Soulfly and a European jaunt in March.See dates here: